Somali is a Cushitic language with about 15 million speakers in Somali, Ethiopia, Djibouti, Kenya, Yemen, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Italy, Finland, Sweden and the UK.

The Somali or Osmanya alphabet was created in 1922 by Cismaan Kenadiid, brother of the Sultan of Obbia. It was not widely used, apart from for private correspondence. In 1961 both the Latin and Osmanya scripts were adopted for use in Somalia, but in 1969 there was a coup, with one of its stated aims the resolution of the debate over the country's writing system. The Latin alphabet was finally adopted in 1972 and at the same time Somali was made the sole official language of Somalia.

Somali is one of the many languages in Africa, but is also spoken in the UK and other parts of Europe as an ethnic language.

Somali is one of the languages occasionally translated by Comms Multilingual. Somali translation projects have included work on advertisements, brochures, manuals, newsletters.